How to Create an Emergency Action Plan

Needs will vary based on age, disabilities, and other factors. Discuss how you will help one another with things like:

• Dietary requirements
• Operation of medical equipment
• Prescriptions
• Functional equipment and mobility devices
• Support for school-aged children
• Languages, cultural, and religious considerations
• Pets or service animals

Next step

You may not be together when disaster strikes, so it’s important to be on the same page about how you will reconnect. Here’s a ready-to-go form from Ready.gov that you can fill out online, email to everyone in your household, and print to have at the ready.

Next step

Here are a few next steps for you and the rest of your household to take together:

• Sign up for emergency alerts and warnings to get notified of a natural disaster.
• Find your nearest shelter, and plan how to get there and where to meet if you are separated.
• Confirm your local evacuation route so you know what to do if you must leave quickly.
• Determine your communication plan — will you text or call? Does everyone have all relevant phone numbers and addresses?
• Build your emergency preparedness kit so you can grab it and go without wasting time.